Last Week's Thrifty Moves

After checking the ads Sunday morning I went to the store and picked up a few things.  I found ground pork and pork chops in the markdown bin as well as two family packs on sale at Albertson's.  I came home and repackaged everything right away and was able to mark off the last items from my freezer stock up plan for winter.  I didn't do any other grocery shopping all week.

A friend of ours gave us a shopping bag full of cucumbers.  On Sunday the oldest and I made 5 quarts and 2 pints of dill pickles out of them and the last of the ones from our little garden.  We also made another 6 pints of salsa.  Later in the week, when the bell peppers and jalapeños were ready in the garden we were able to make another 6 pints of salsa.

It turned out to be quite a week of using stuff up.  I popped the lid off of a bottle of hair conditioner so I could use up every last bit of it.  I also stuck a scrap of bath soap to a new bar so it is much easier to use it all up.  I finished using up the last of a bottle of deodorant.  After leaving a bottle of hand lotion upside down on my desk at work I used up the last of it as well.

In the kitchen we used up the last of a bottle of cocktail sauce.  I used a rubber spatula to clean out a jar of peanut butter which was plenty for a sandwich.  I used up every last bit of a bottle of dish soap adding water and completely rinsing it out which allowed me to do several more loads of dishes.  I rinsed off the residue from the cap and was able to have enough soap to wash a small load of dishes.

Breakfast hash.  Yum.

I veered off of our meal plan a little bit so I could use up a few things that had been hanging around in the freezer for awhile.  I baked a frozen meat loaf in our slow cooker for Sunday dinner with a few scrubbed potatoes.  We used up some lunchmeat by making sandwiches for supper one night.  I put some bone-in chicken from the freezer into the slow cooker with some carrots and celery to make broth.  I used the meat to make enchiladas which actually was on the meal plan.  We cleaned out the crisper drawer and made salads all week to go with our meals.

I made a simple lap quilt to give a dear family friend of ours on her birthday.  She lives in a nursing home so lap quilts are really nice to have, especially with winter coming.  I used fabric from my stash, batting I had bought on sale and with a coupon at JoAnn's and instead of tying it with yarn I used buttons from my button jar.  I am really happy with how it turned out and I am thrilled she likes it.

We almost always go out to dinner to celebrate our birthdays.  This year instead of spending the money on dining out for my birthday I decided to use that money to buy rib eye steaks and shrimp and we dine at home.  Those steaks were absolutely delicious and I didn't mind fixing my own dinner one bit.  Of course, I had wonderful helpers.  We finished off our meal with a slice of homemade cheesecake.

With the money left from my birthday dinner budget we went out to lunch on Saturday.  I had a coupon for a free kid's meal.  As usual we drank water so I only had to pay for two meals.

My oldest mended a hole in her black tights.  She made me so proud.  She also took the fresh cilantro that was leftover after making salsa and dried it so we will have it to use later on.  She was able to fill up a little spice jar for me.

Pickles in progress

I gave my next door neighbor two more paperback books I had read from my thrift store stash.  Now that I've pretty much depleted my stash I'm going back to library books.  After all, they're free.

I renewed my daughter's library book online saving us a trip to the library.  None of us is ready to check out more books right now so it was the perfect solution.  In a couple weeks I expect we'll be making a trip.

I composted coffee grounds, tea bags, egg shells, onion and garlic skins, trimmings from jalapeño peppers and some veggies I found in the crisper that had gone way past their prime.

I gave the chickens some kitchen scraps after making salads, baked potato skins, some stale bread and a couple extra pancakes we had from breakfast one day.  I toasted the stale bread for them, but I don't think that makes them spoiled in any way. LOL.

The chickens blessed us with 24 eggs last week.  I just love those girls.

How thrifty were you last week?